I cover the video game industry, write about gamers, and review video games.
You can follow me on Twitter and hit me up there if you have any questions or comments you'd like to chat about.
Disclosure: Many of the video games I review were provided as free review copies. This does not influence my coverage or reviews of these games.
I do not own stock in any of the companies I cover. I do not back any Kickstarter projects related to video games. I do not fund anyone in the industry on Patreon.

Persona 4 Golden is one of the best games available on the PS Vita—it just took me a while to realize that.

I had no idea what to expect when I first started playing Persona 4 Golden. I’m not only a newcomer to the Persona games (though I have played some Persona 4 Arena on the PS3) I’m beyond rusty when it comes to JRPGs.

I’ve been doing my best to remedy that, playing games like Valkyria Chronicles and Xenoblade Chronicles recently, as well as the new Fire Emblem game. I plan on playing The Last Story soon, also, and writing about that.

So I’m catching up, and I’m glad I am, because these are all excellent games (and to top it all off, I’m in the middle of Ni No Kuni: Wrath of the White Witch which is just delightful.)

So anyways, I had no idea what I was getting into with Persona 4 Golden, and about two hours in I still didn’t know.

Actually, about two hours into the game I was pretty sure I was going to have to give up. I was just…so bored.

Then I summoned my first Persona, and everything changed.

Okay, it didn’t change quickly. There was still some seriously determined foot-dragging on the way to the actual game, but it was a cool enough moment that I decided I needed to keep on keeping on.

Now I’m hooked.

The odd juggling of the mundane and the fantastical is really addictive. Managing your routine—cultural and sports clubs, a job, your friends and social links—alongside your TV-world spelunking grows increasingly difficult, but it’s also strangely satisfying. It’s like no other RPG I’ve played, Japanese or otherwise.

It’s a game about broken people, and specifically broken teenagers. There’s angst and enthusiasm and a search for self, and I really love how building social links with other people, finding community and fraternity, is at the core of the game.

Leveling up your character and Personas isn’t just about fighting Shadows (though that’s an important part of the game) but also about building yourself as a person who is connected to the world. It’s sort of an odd twist to a video game, and I’m a little surprised at how well it works.

There’s moments of laughable cheese sprinkled throughout the writing, and I know that even in its English-language iteration I’m still losing some things to translation. But I don’t mind. As a kid I used to play Super Nintendo games with my Japanese friend all in Japanese, so I’ve had a harder time bridging cultural and linguistic gaps in the past.

More to the point, the struggles characters in Persona 4 Golden face are things teenagers (and people in general, really) struggle with—universal conflicts with self, with depression, friendship, and family expectations.

Combat itself is turn-based and fairly deep. You and your team of friends fight against various monsters in the TV world using an array of weapons, items, and your Personas. Each Persona is different, and has different powers, and each monster you encounter has different powers, strengths, and weaknesses. To do well in a fight, you need to exploit these weaknesses, determine when it’s best to defend rather than attack, and keep your team alive.

It’s actually really fun. The game can be enormously challenging at times, requiring you to test and re-test your strategy, or come back later better equipped for the fight.

Of course, beyond combat there’s tons more to do, from the aforementioned social activities, to simply observing the world around you, and there’s a mystery, of course, to give the narrative its drive.

It’s also sort of tragic at times, and not just the grisly murders that the game opens with. The loneliness in the game is palpable at times, but never more so than with the family your main character lives with. Your young cousin apparently spends her entire life taking care of the house and watching TV while your uncle, a police detective, absorbs himself in his work. I want to drop everything I’m doing and take her to the park.

It’s a deep game, in many ways, even with its at-times childish surface (and goofy dialogue.) Both in terms of its thematic thrust and its combat and non-combat elements, the game is one of the more complex RPGs I’ve played recently. For someone with a deep attention deficit, its time-management component is certainly a challenge.

It’s also one of the best titles on Sony’s PlayStation Vita so far.

I haven’t finished the game yet—it’s rather sprawling—so stay tuned for further updates.

Post Your Comment

Post Your Reply

Forbes writers have the ability to call out member comments they find particularly interesting. Called-out comments are highlighted across the Forbes network. You'll be notified if your comment is called out.

Persona games always start out slow as it slowly introduces everybody, and more importantly there is a big mystery brewing. I’m a sucker for good stories, so I was sucked in relatively quickly, but it took the first dungeon for me to get completely hook. As you said, the social links is very interesting and relates to everyday life. I feel like Atlus has done a good job with writing as each character feels unique with their own issues and problems that you, the player, can relate and feel for them.

Then the mystery with the murders is really interesting, and a minor spoiler but things get really interesting late in the year when you’ll dialogue will impact the ending. I hope that doesn’t ruin anything for you, but for me when you are in November and December months is when things get really interesting and makes it hard to put the game down.

It’s a game that takes a while to gear up. The beginning is really slow, but it gets better, and it doesn’t stop getting better. All the characters say cheesy things but harbor a hidden deeper drama that always comes together. It presents it’self as happy-go-lucky, but isn’t afraid to be depressing. I often found myself lulled into a sense of secure bliss which quickly gets broken by some of the character’s very believable fears. Having control of your day to day schedule gives the game a feeling of meaningful control and freedom that I haven’t felt in any other JRPG. It surprised me how much can branch at the end, and how much you really think. If you don’t know who the real killer is, please don’t look it up. I got too caught up in the day by day sense of forward momentum that I never took the time to look back and really piece things together, but only now do I see that all the pieces of the puzzle were in plain sight and that maybe looking it up on gamefaqs cheapened my experience.

It is an updated version that includes new events and two new social links. I was very hesitant at first to get this because I still play the PS2 version and rarely do anything with remakes. However, curiosity got to me.

Anyhow, it is worth getting for anyone who has done the original for a few reasons. There is the original material and then plenty new material that adds a new facet, such as a new dungeon that also offers a possible answer of why it’s better not to enter just any TV aside from the one from Junes. Oh, and the costuming system from at least P3:FES has returned and include things such as a cat costume for Naoto. Plus, there’s an extra ending that seemingly ties P4:Arena with the game that you finished.

I have to say I was surprised when I say that you were reviewing this game. However I am glad, as it is a one of a kind experience.

Persona 4 is laugh out loud funny at times, especially when Kanji starts showing up. I really enjoyed the game as the dialog felt real at times. Between people asking which girl you like and remembering to go to practice, the game makes you feel like a teenage again at times. Skipping drama club or a soccer practice can make you feel guilty at times.

I wish Persona 4 golden wasn’t only on the Vita, as i don’t have much desire to purchase a vita just for the extra that Persona 4 golden brings.

I think those different feelings were a reason I enjoyed the game so much, not to mention the story/gameplay are outside the typical jrpg trobes. Instead of fetch quests being the daily routine, it is raising social links. Instead of trying to prevent an evil bad guy from taking over the world, it is a a murder mystery about serial killer. A breath of fresh air imo.

I just realized that I used at times a lot in that last comment. Will try to control that.